Pesticides in Schools: From Indifference to Concern

Three years ago, whenever janitors or outside contractors used
pesticides at her school, Faith Glerum, then a 5th grader, became very
ill.

For two days after each application, her mother reports, the Glen
Ridge (N.J.) Middle School pupil would get red blotches on her face,
swollen ears, and a sore throat. And when janitors applied an extra
dose of the pesticide diazinon to rid the school of roaches, she says,
Faith lost her sense of balance.

Several years and countless arguments with school officials later,
Gigi Glerum is still demanding that the officials provide a
pesticide-free environment for her "chemically sensitive'' daughter,
now enrolled in another school district.

Ms. Glerum, along with other parents, school employees, and
environmental activists nationwide, maintain that schools have become
the unlikely dumping ground for highly toxic chemicals that have not
been adequately tested by the Environmental Protection Agency for their
potential health effects.

These critics have been joined by a growing number of federal,
state, and local officials in arguing that the public, including school
personnel, does not realize that pesticides have not been deemed
entirely "safe'' by the EPA, and that chemicals are frequently applied
by individuals ignorant of their toxicity.

For those reasons, the critics say, pesticide use should be severely
restricted around children, who have more vulnerable immune systems
than adults. They cite dozens of instances across the country in which
children have reportedly become ill after pesticides were applied in
schools.

"Basically, in our society, toxic chemicals are considered safe
until proven otherwise,'' says Mary O'Brien, the information
coordinator for the Northwest Coalition for Alternatives to
Pesticides.

It should be the other way around, she insists; the burden of proof
should be on those who make the chemicals to prove that they are
safe.

In response to these concerns, the Congress is considering
amendments to the federal pesticide-control law. States, too, are
showing greater interest in pesticide regulation. And a number of
school districts, deciding that chemical pesticides are both
unnecessary and unduly risky, have adopted guidelines that greatly
reduce their use.

Public Unaware

Although it has been 25 years since the publication of Rachel
Carson's Silent Spring, the public remains uninformed about the risks
posed by pesticides, critics charge.

Once regarded as mainly an agricultural problem, pesticide use has
increased dramatically in both urban and suburban areas over the past
20 years. In 1984, notes a study by the U.S. General Accounting Office
on nonagricultural pesticides, nearly 1.5 billion pounds of the
chemicals were used in the United States.

Although about 80 percent of all pesticides are applied in farming,
some believe that urban and suburban dwellers are now subjected to more
concentrated doses of the chemicals than are farmers.

Part of the problem, states the report, is the label that is
required on all pesticides.

Many consumers interpret the label, which lists an EPA registration
number, as proof that the chemical is safe, the report notes. But that
indicates only that the product has been registered, not that it has
been tested.

In fact, the EPA has tested very few chemicals for all potential
side-effects and will not complete that process until the next
century.

School Use Increasing

Although no national figures exist on the frequency of pesticide
applications on school grounds, experts say the practice is widespread
and that schools have increased their use of pesticides over the
years.

School maintenance programs routinely involve treatments for indoor
pests, such as ants and roaches, and outdoor problems with weeds and
lawn care.

According to a 1987 survey by the Better Government Association, a
Chicago-based advocacy group, 21 of 38 Chicago-area school districts
questioned said they applied pesticides at least once a month.

The survey, which also examined chemical usage in 11 Southern
districts, found that 10 used pesticides.

In two California counties, according to 1986 and 1987 surveys by
Citizens for a Better Environment, a San Francisco group, all but one
school district regularly applied pesticides. Only one of the districts
in Alameda County and none in Contra Costa County had a comprehensive
pest-management policy at the time of the survey.

Many of the school districts in Contra Costa, the group also found,
violated federal and county pesticide regulations.

Few Are Concerned

Despite the widespread use of pesticides, few organizations
representing the occupants of school buildings have closely examined
the amount or types of chemicals applied.

Neither major teachers' union, for example, has expressed a position
on the issue. And the two unions that represent many school janitors
and food-service workers--the Service Employees International Union and
the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees--say
their concern is for better training for their members who apply
chemicals.

The National PTA, in contrast, called on state and local officials
in 1985 to monitor school pesticide use more diligently and to promote
less toxic solutions to pest problems.

Unknown Risks

Opponents of pesticide use argue that routine sprayings inside
schools and on school grounds are unnecessary. And because some of the
pesticides most widely used by schools have been linked to short- and
long-term health problems, they say, school officials should pay
greater attention to the programs they authorize.

Some of the pesticides viewed as dangerous are:

Diazinon. Normally used in schools to control both indoor and
outdoor pests, this product was banned last month by the EPA for use
on golf courses and sod farms because waterfowl had died after its
application;

Lindane. An ingredient in head-lice shampoo, Lindane was found in
large quantities in Love Canal, N.Y., an area blighted by toxic
wastes;

2,4-D. Applied on school lawns and athletic fields, this chemical
is a component of Agent Orange. Late last year, in a federal district
court in Marshall, Tex., a jury for the first time concluded that
2,4-D was linked to a worker's death; it awarded the family of a
former forestry worker $1.5 million. The case is being appealed by
the product's manufacturers.

After a recent study by the National Cancer Institute linked 2,4-D
with elevated levels of certain types of cancers among Kansas farmers,
ChemLawn, the country's largest lawn-care company, stopped using the
pesticide.

"ChemLawn doesn't want to be responsible for workers who use
2,4-D,'' says Ms. O'Brien. "Why should school districts?''

Chemical Sensitivity

As more chemically sensitive students and teachers make their
complaints known, experts predict, schools will be under increasing
pressure to maintain a pesticide-free environment.

In some districts, parents have successfully pressed to have their
children classified as special-education students to remove them from
exposure to pesticides, and in many cases to allow them to be taught at
home. And teachers in a Contra County, Calif., school district, are
pressing to have a defined pest-management policy be part of their
contract negotiations.

According to some experts, frequent exposure to pesticides, many of
which resemble nerve gas in their composition, results in a weakened
immune system and a heightened sensitivity to all chemicals. They argue
that chemically sensitive individuals can experience flu-like symptoms
when exposed to even minute amounts of such chemicals.

Chemically sensitive children and teachers are also more likely to
miss days of school, some observers say, and to feel that they are not
performing at their best.

Faith Glerum, for example, missed between one-quarter and one-third
of the school year because of her allergic reaction to the pesticides,
according to her mother.

But because the reactions of chemically sensitive people are
difficult to link unequivocally to exposure to pesticides, school
officials, industry spokesmen, and even physicians are often skeptical.
That lack of sympathy and understanding, when combined with the
frequent absences from school, can have a profound effect on a child's
academic performance, some experts maintain.

"If a child has a problem in school because his nervous system is
being depressed, that is going to affect him as an adult because he
won't be able to read or write properly,'' says Beverly Paigen, a
senior research biochemist at the Children's Hospital Medical Center in
Oakland, Calif.

"Pesticides have been selected because they kill pests,'' she
argues. "They adversely affect all living things, whether they are
insects, animals, or children.''

As a result, notes Victor M. Sher, a lawyer for the Sierra Club
National Defense Fund, Inc., school districts that continue to spray
pesticides as a matter of course could be subject to lawsuits.

"If you stop and think about it, spraying kids in schools or in any
state program is like grabbing them and giving them a very lethal
drug,'' he says. "They can't say no.''

Neurotic Disorder'

Many others, however, hotly dispute the existence of a condition
called "chemical sensitivity.''

"We feel that there may indeed be some people who are hypersensitive
out there, but their occurrences are extremely rare,'' says Barry
Troutman, director of education for the Professional Lawn Care
Association. "In general, these people list such a wide range of
chemicals. It seems unrealistic from a medical standpoint that someone
could be sensitive to that wide a range of products.''

Joel Paul, a spokesman for the National Pest Control Association,
contends that many people who claim they are chemically sensitive are
actually allergic to the pests that the chemical is supposed to
control. Others, he says, have "delusory parasitosis, a distinct fear
of insects. It's a neurotic disorder of people that can never be
controlled.''

Slow Process

Both the EPA and the environmental activists agree that the federal
law that regulates pesticides contains serious flaws that prevent the
agency from fully carrrying out its regulatory function.

Since 1972, when the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide
Act (FIFRA) was amended by the Congress, the EPA has been required to
look at the potential risks of all pesticides. No pesticide can be
registered, the law mandates, until the agency determines that its use
would not cause "unreasonable effects on the environment.''

The approximately 50,000 pesticides on the market at the time were
allowed to remain in use until the agency was able to re-register
them.

Later amendments to the law required the agency only to review the
results of tests performed on the pesticides' active ingredient--the
chemical that kills or controls the pest--before a product could be
registered or re-registered. There are 600 such active ingredients in
various pesticides.

But this process, the critics claim and the agency acknowledges, has
been painfully slow. To date, only 4 of the 600 have been fully
reassessed, and many have not received a preliminary evaluation. Even
the most optimistic observers believe that the task will not be
completed before the middle of the 21st century.

"A lot of people think, 'Gee, this is terrible to have all these
unexamined chemicals out there,''' says Anne Lindsay, chief of the
policy and special projects division of the agency's office of
pesticides programs. "But they have to understand that according to
FIFRA, in order to avoid some pretty severe economic effects, we can't
decide to take chemicals off the market without the data.''

The agency's special review process for chemicals believed to be
especially hazardous is equally slow, averaging between two and six
years.

Experts say the chemicals commonly used in schools are not high on
the priority list of the agency's pesticide program.

Because most pesticides are used for agriculture, the E.P.A. has
focused most of its attention on chemicals that affect food products.
And in recent public remarks, agency officials have said they expect to
place greater emphasis on reviewing chemicals that they have already
begun to evaluate than on beginning new evaluations.

'FIFRA-Shock'

"When we register a product, we're not saying that it is safe,''
said Edward Tinsworth, director of the registration division of the
EPA's office of pesticide programs at a recent forum held by the
National Coalition Against the Misuse of Pesticides. "We're saying that
there is no unreasonable risk, which means there may be a risk.''

Advocates for the environment and agency officials are quick to list
the pesticide law's deficiencies, such as the requirement that the EPA
buy up the entire stock of any chemical it wants to ban. Such a
budget-busting provision, both sides agree, makes the agency think
twice before it takes that final regulatory step. But environmentalists
maintain that the law is also fundamentally flawed because it:

Requires that the chemical be evaluated through a cost-benefit
analysis, instead of on a health-based standard;

Allows the manufacturer to perform the tests;

Does not require testing on the health effects of a pesticide's
full formulation, which includes both the active ingredient and its
secondary ingredients, known as inert ingredients.

When most people hear about the inadequacies of the law for the
first time, says Ms. O'Brien, "we say they go into FIFRA-shock.''

Untrained Applicators

Experts also say that schools may be adversely affected by the law's
weak requirements for training pesticide "applicators''--those who
spray or otherwise apply the chemical treatments.

Every state determines its requirements for certification, which the
E.P.A. requires for access to certain chemicals. Typically, an
applicant for certification must attend a multi-week class and pass a
written test.

Despite the certification process, however, FIFRA allows
noncertified applicators to use pesticides under the supervision of a
certified applicator. As a result, many people who spray on school
grounds, including both outside contractors and school janitors, may
not have attended the course or passed the examination.

In addition, because of a loophole in the federal law, many states
allow noncertified school janitors and other noncommercial applicators
to apply restricted products because they do not personally profit from
spraying.

"People like school janitors are much less likely to get training,''
says Ron Brickman, who is coordinating a study on the training that
pesticide applicators receive for both the EPA and the National
Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges.

"They are much more likely to just read the label, which could be
very confusing,'' he says.

An amended version of FIFRA, now being considered by a Senate
committee, would require more training for these noncertified
applicators.

The amended legislation also requires pesticide manufacturers to pay
a fee to fund the E.P.A.'s registration effort, which, under the bill,
would be completed in a decade. The bill also calls for the regulation
of inert ingredients, and would allow the agency to ban products
without paying for their recall.

Interest in regulating pesticide use has been growing among state
and local governments, as well as at the federal level.

State and Local Activity

In February, New York State Attorney General Robert Abrams filed a
lawsuit against ChemLawn, a firm that services many schools, for
advertising that its products are "practically nontoxic'' and "do not
present a health risk.''

In New Jersey, a proposed regulation would require notices to be
posted in all public buildings, including schools, before a pesticide
is applied.

And in Oregon, following several incidents in which children and
staff members became ill after pesticide applications at schools, the
state's department of human resources sent suggested guidelines for
pesticide use to all superintendents.

On the local level, some school systems have adopted policies that
either greatly reduced or eliminated the use of pesticides on school
grounds. Among the districts are Berkeley, Calif., Eugene, Ore., Grand
Rapids, Mich., and Kenmore-Town of Tonawanda, N.Y.

Most of the new policies require districts to consider all
alternatives to pesticides before they spray. And if they do have to
spray, they can use chemicals only when students will not be on or near
school grounds.

"We really didn't have a policy, we had practices,'' said Patrick
Sandro, the assistant superintendent for operations for the Grand
Rapids school district.

"Now,'' he says, "rather than have a routine spraying--what some
people would call a 'bombing'--we select areas where we observe a
problem.''

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